Birders, forest dept officials working on Delhi 'Bird Atlas'

NEW DELHI: The Delhi forest department is planning to bring up a Bird Atlas, which will be a comprehensive guide with bird species in the Capital, their geographical distribution, and habitats.

- Jasjeev Gandhiok

The publication will be prepared with the help of surveys to be majorly conducted by citizen birders across groups such as the Delhi Bird Group, Bird Count India, students and NGOs, forest department officials said on Friday. A final approval from the government, however, is pending.

According to the plan, two surveys will be carried out to dig the information for Bird Atlas -- the first survey is scheduled to start next month while the second one is planned in July, and the Atlas is likely to be released in December 2025.

The methodology for the atlas involves first dividing Delhi into grids of 6.6 sq km each. Each grid has a quadrant of size 3.3 sq km, which is further divided into sub-cells of 1.1 sq km. As part of the survey, 145 sub-cells of 1.1 sq km each will be covered by birders.